MARK
BILLINGHAM - In The Dark
Published 1 August
by Sphere $32.99
Mark Billingham, author of the popular
Tom Thorne detective series, has now written his first stand-alone thriller 'In
The Dark', his most powerful novel yet.
As well as
being a bestselling crime writer, Mark Billingham is also a stand-up comedian
and has appeared on over thirty radio and TV shows and played in every comedy
club in the UK. He's a regular performer and MC at London's world famous Comedy
Store, where he waxes lyrical about animal husbandry and takes the piss out of
people's shirts. To read about what crime writing and comedy have in common, read
Mark's essay 'So this serial killer walks into a bar' below.
Mark
Billingham was born and brought up in Birmingham. Having worked for some years
as an actor and more recently as a TV writer and stand-up comedian his first crime
novel was published in 2001. 'Sleepyhead' was an instant bestseller in the UK.
It has been sold widely throughout the world and was published in the USA in the
summer of 2002. Though still occasionally working as a stand-up comic, Mark mostly
concentrates on writing the series of crime novels featuring London-based detective
Tom Thorne. The second novel, 'Scaredy Cat' was published in July 2002 and was
followed by 'Lazybones', 'The Burning Girl', 'Lifeless' and 'Buried'. The newest
Tom Thorne novel 'Death Message' is available now. Mark lives in North London
with his wife and two children.
So this serial killer walks
into a bar...
The question I am asked most often in interviews
is why a stand-up comic would want to write a novel so dark. Why should a gag
merchant be so obsessed with death and matters even more disturbing? Why should
somebody who spends his nights on stage trying to slay an audience and avoid dying,
spend his days at the word processor making his characters do exactly those things...?
There
are lots of reasons, none of which will be particularly surprising. What is surprising
however, is that writing a dark and disturbing crime novel and performing stand-up
comedy are not as different as one might suppose.
I am not
the only reader who, in the books he reads, seeks something far removed from the
world he inhabits. Thus, when I settle down with a book, comic-crime novels are
pretty much as close as I come to a busman's holiday. The novels I read, though
never completely without humour, lean far more towards the hardboiled and darkly
disturbing. The word caper in the blurb is pretty much guaranteed to make me leave
any book exactly where I found it. When it came to writing Sleepyhead, I was basically
trying to keep it simple, and write the sort of book I would like to read. No
surprise then that it didn't turn out to be a comedy crime novel.
This
isn't to say that Sleepyhead is without humour - even if does come from the most
surprising direction - or that I never tried my hand at a comic crime novel. Two
years ago, at the same time that I was writing the beginning of what would eventually
become Sleepyhead, I began what would hopefully be a funny crime novel set in
my home town of Birmingham. When both books were about 3000 words long I sent
them off to the only contact I had in publishing (a well-respected editor at a
major house), along with a couple of agents. The response was unanimous. Forget
the comedy. I think this was more a comment on the tastes of publishers than the
comic content (or otherwise) of what I had written. I was told in no uncertain
terms that comic crime scares the pants of most publishers. This is borne out
by the dearth of big name writers in this field. Everyone always mentions Hiaasen,
or possibly Evanovich and that's about it. The fact that in the UK, bar Ripley,
Gutteridge and maybe Chris Brookmyre and Marc Blake, there is pretty much nobody
selling any books in this sub genre, would seem to confirm that the advice I was
being given was sound. That year, at Deansgate, there was a panel entitled "does
humour hurt your sales figures?". That put the tin lid on it. Comedy and
crime were not for me...
The subject matter of Sleepyhead and
its recently completed follow-up could not be further removed from that which
I trot out at the Comedy Store or Jongleurs. However, answering the frequently
asked question that I began by quoting, has made me realise that the same techniques
are required when writing crime fiction and performing stand-up comedy.
A
strong opening is of course, crucial. That first gag has got to be a cracker if
the crowd is to trust you and to relax into your material. Ditto the readers of
your book. Most have not got time to give a novel the 'benefit of the doubt' or
to 'persevere' if it doesn't grab them straight away. If the audience/reader is
to be engaged, it needs to be done pretty bloody quickly. Whether in a sweaty,
smoky club or nestled in a favourite armchair, good money has been paid and the
attention has got to be grabbed by the scruff of the neck if you are not to be
heckled off the stage or find your novel discarded in favour of the latest Alan
Titchmarsh opus. The same applies to the climax of your act/novel. The big finish
is all important. Whether your loose ends are to be tied up or left dangling,
whether you leave the audience on a shaggy dog story or a song, a bang is always
preferable to a whimper...
To read more, visit www.markbillingham.com
